Transforming My Big Fat Belly Problem

The nearest Weight Watchers store isn’t a difficult trek from my office. In fact, it’s downhill. But I’ve been dragging my feet about going there for my Official Dr. Oz Transformation Nation Weigh-in. I really don’t want to know how much I weigh.

I know I’m fat. All my weight hangs in a prominent place—several inches over my belt. This is visible in the mirror, when I look down at my feet and especially when I button my pants. But if visual cues aren’t enough, my 5-year-old son has been poking this mass, giggling and saying: “Daddy, you have a big, fat belly.” We’re working to correct his behavior, but, really, he has a point.

Which is why I’ve signed up for Dr. Oz’s Transformation Nation. And it’s why I walked down to Weight Watchers today for my official weigh-in. (To be eligible for the programs grand prize—a million bucks!—you must weigh in by February 26.) I need to lose a whole lot of my big, fat belly.

I was tracking my weight for much of the last year, weighing myself daily on a bathroom scale. I believe that monitoring something—my weight, my eating habits, my expenditures—is the only way to change it. And my weight is something I’ve been trying to change for a very long time.

But I stopped weighing because I wasn’t seeing much progress.

Much of my life is healthy. I’m active, jogging or walking more than 20 miles a week. I eat healthy, with a heavy emphasis on fruits, vegetables and healthy fats like the omega-3s found in fish. I drink alcohol sparingly.

How can I weigh so much? Years of not living healthy have piled pounds around my midsection. Having diabetes also complicates my efforts to lose weight—and, ironically, having diabetes makes it all the more important to shed my love handles.

It’s more difficult for me to manage my disease because I’m overweight. The more I weigh, the greater my insulin resistance. The greater my insulin resistance, the more insulin I have to take to keep my blood glucose levels normal. All that insulin can actually cause weight gain if I don’t restrict my food consumption.

The best way to break this cycle is to get even healthier. I know I have to cut calories and redouble my exercise efforts. But to transform myself into a leaner, healthier person, I also have to have a starting point, which today was a short, downhill walk to a simple weigh-in. Why not join me? Weigh in now!

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